Offaly Hurling team for championship v Dublin

[atomic]

Who do ye think will replace him at centre back? I wouldn't want to see david kenny or joe bergin moved as they are needed where they are. is possibly dell morkan solid enough to move in there? there is probably a much more obvious choice that i just can't see

[manfromdelmonte]

in relation to development of players etc as related to by other posters, i think that there are a lot of issues involved. Some have remarked that we will only get 3/4 per minor team anyway to graduate from senior level and that we are doing ok in this regard given the size of the county. I think this idea masks an awful lot.

1 As a county, underage football has been getting some degree of success in the past few years. This has been down to a lot of good combined work done within schools and clubs and county. However, we must really ask what the term "development" means and only then can we guage if we are making progress like other counties in Hurling (Westmeath, Dublin and Carlow who have all passed us out at underage development level).
To me "development" means making a player better skilled, physically and mentally stronger, faster, more agile and tactically more aware. Are our young players in these underage squads getting a type of training that is developing all of these areas. If they are not, then there is no development, just extra training with a higher calibre of player than they have at club level.

Other counties have been developing these areas in the past few years and sadly, we are not up to speed.
To really develop these players, high quality coaches with the requisite skills to develop these areas need to be put in place. here are a few questions.... As part of being in the county squad, Do these players have access to Highly skilled coaches to develop skills and tactical awareness?? strength and conditioning expertise to develop strength, fitness coaches to develop speed, running technique, agility and reaction times, and sport psychologists to develop mental strength. If the answer is no, then are we really developing players or just training the better footballers in the various age groups.

It was blatantly obvious in the minor football match with kildare and hurling game with westmeath, that we are behind in all of these areas, especially strength and speed. Other counties have addressed these issues and have programmes in place with the best coaches and paid experts (sport science and psychology) in their counties in with these teams. My opinion is that this is not the case in offaly and most especially on the hurling front.

Another major issue is that there is a lot of nepotism that exists throughout the GAA in offaly be it from clubs sending in their own sons from u 14 level to a serious bias against North Offaly in the hurling areas for selection of county teams. also the selection of minor and u 21 management is an absolute farce, especially in hurling. People are pulled out of the woodwork to work with these teams with no coaching experience just because the might have been a great hurler one time. either that or they are a known as mad passionate Offaly GAA man who will get them psyched up no end having done no degree of quality training and coaching. Where is the development under this type of structure. The day of the dinosaur on the coaching front running hills and laps and not pucking a ball in training is long gone i am afraid but offaly have not realised this at the top table. Those on the committees who are making key decisions are clueless with regard to what is actually required to improve the whole structure. this even transfers to key decisions regarding choice of senior management and their support structures. This is why we are where we are.

In relation to North Offaly hurling, St Davids win u 21 and four lads get called to county 21 level, 3 of whom cant make a minor panel the previous year because they are from the wrong club or dont go to school in the right place. It is rife all over and a lot of hurlers are lost because of this. Clara have at least 3 hurlers good enough for co minor hurling between last year and this year but none were in there. Did Finbarr Cullen hurl in an all ireland minor final??? and would an edenderry young lad be even considered for an offaly hurling panel now. those in charge need to be neutral and pick the best players at 14. when this doesnt happen, lads get browned off and wont go in when they are older. Steven Egan is a case in point and would not be hurling with offaly now only that Joe Dooley knew how good he was and kept bringing him, ditto derek molloy.

On the football front, the major fall down area appears to be the transition from minor to 21. Good work has seen offaly more than competitive up to minor level reaching 3/4 leinster finals in 6 years. in this time though, i dont think we have won 1 u 21 match. is there development of players in relation to the areas mentioned for players at this time, I Think not.

So going forward, we can look and talk about development all we like but we are only paying lip service and no development is really happening if players are not improving thro a coherent strategised programme to improve these key areas like all the other counties have introduced.

there are plenty of examples of proper development structures, ie kildare football, Armagh hurling, dublin, westmeath and carlow underage hurling. another example of real development has been the cork footballers in the past few years. Offaly drew with them twice in the league in 05 and 06. look where they have gone since compared with Offaly. they did this with a strategic programme in place addressing all of the areas mentioned above. The politics was taken out of Cork GAA by Billy Morgan and he picked the best players whether they were from junior, inter or senior clubs. Half of that cork senior football panel come from junior or intermediate clubs. this was continued by counihan where no political bulls#@t was tolerated. the same goes for cody in KK and we all see what happened there. In Offaly, St Vincents underage have been a driving force and they play with Cappincur, Daingean, Kilclonfert and ballycommon. they are at the very centre of the football area in offaly. When was the last time that anybody from any of these clubs played senior league or championship with offaly. Ditto Na Fianna underage. We need to open our eyes big time or we will be a laughing stock for many many years ahead and we will still be asking where it all went wrong...

interesting reading
I'd look more at what our near neighbours in Roscommon are doing in football. they've a small pick (population) based mainly on rural parishes (small number of clubs) and yet seem to be putting it up to Galway/Mayo on all fronts - who have far more clubs, players, schools and resources
beating all the surrounding counties at U16 level
they are a consistant force at county minor for last 6/7 years
won provincial U21 last year, got to final this year
won AI Colleges B title for first time ever in 2011
club football champions got to AI final
connacht champs 2010

[cromabu]

Anyone know who the subs v Dublin were. Heres a few

16. Eoin Kelly
17. Cathal Parlon
18.
20.
21. James Mulrooney
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.